Dear Debra, surely virtual relations are different from real-life relations. The virtual world is more open, less frightening, because it appeals to our inner world, without the necessity of physical strain or commitment.

Thus, our relation here are certainly easier. 

My dad always taught me not to talk to strangers, and i wouldn't dare go mingling interesting conversations on the streets of my hometown, with total strangers... I do, here, on RG, and I love that sense of liberation. I'm sure my Dad won't reprehend me for talking to you!

( + I trust RG management to filter the selection of people that I am allowed to speak to !!!)

Dear Debra, surely virtual relations are different from real-life relations. The virtual world is more open, less frightening, because it appeals to our inner world, without the necessity of physical strain or commitment.

Thus, our relation here are certainly easier. 

My dad always taught me not to talk to strangers, and i wouldn't dare go mingling interesting conversations on the streets of my hometown, with total strangers... I do, here, on RG, and I love that sense of liberation. I'm sure my Dad won't reprehend me for talking to you!

( + I trust RG management to filter the selection of people that I am allowed to speak to !!!)

Dear Debra.

I like your question very much.

I think we share in RG so easily because our desire to be free and express our opinion bases on respecto for / from another colleagues, without rejecting those who already have prejudices about us or our work.

Thank you for inviting me to give an answer to this question.

Regards.

Hello dear researchers;

I would say that we are sharing on RG more than universities  because we have a reputation to defend and maintain on RG, a motivation (the RG score that we want to keep it rising) .

Kind regards.

I'm pretty new at RG, but from what I see, at RG you share easily anything about your research, because it's easier to do it online at an open community than in a close one like universities, where there are many personal controversies among researchers (both professors and students, especially professors).

Those personal conflicts are the reason also that some researchers don't trust some universities at all, because their ranks sometimes mean nothing compared to what truly happens inside them.

That's just my personal opinion, but that's what I see and hear here many times at Western Greece (for the TEI and the University of Patras).

Hello all!

It is easier because here we never go too deep in crucial issues or compromise the safety of our position or job,  and because this is not an institution.

Dear Debra and all, I do share quite a lot in my own institution.  Recently, some days ago I had an invitation to share in the Ministry of education here.  I will put up that presentation on RG soon.  It was the research done by Enzo and me.  For some reason, the big boss liked it when he read it.  I will be back soon, after church duties.

I prefer people who tell me my faults in person, so I have learned to take correction.  But I do share on RG, FROM THE CONVENIENCE OF HOME AND OFFFICE.  THANKS.

You are right, Miranda. It depends on the place. In the School of Architecture, we have to maintain a "workshop culture". There are hierarchies but they are not "on your face". Teachers and students share a lot, and faculty meets often to talk about new things, recent publications, or to share with invited speakers and experts. It is quite fun. But then there comes a time when it gets hard: student evaluations of faculty, peer evaluations by the personnel committee, class program time when we decide class hours and who teaches what... but that is once a year. Every body survives it. Always. :-)

Dear All

Our universities, though they claim to be universalists, occupy a limited space and provide us only that much as they have. RG, in contrast, provides a supra-university unlimited freedom of expression that is subject only to the respect for other researchers and respect for the search for truth and knowledge. I think these things make it easy to share our intrinsity on RG comparative to the physical space of our universities.

Regards

Dear Debra, a very interesting question. Thank you a lot for asking.

Dear All, look at the number of answers up to now: 9 answers from ladies incl. Debra and only 3 answers from men. Could it be that universities are driven by men and RG not!

 all the other arguments I agree. Reading your comments this came to my mind

Peter

I suppose in an organizational setup, it may be only due to a kind of sibling rivalry and reinforced with wrong perception and rigid attitudes, else people are people, and to expect more of all good (feel - action- reflections) are unwarranted.

Organizations have an assemble of associated members only through acquired properties (degrees, experience, designation etc.,) which need not sync at times within members, This is where the Organization behaviour evolves.

RG is very simple and effective platform to share and explore a research work.

Publishing in university spaces requires a lot of permissions.

Dear colleagues, as I said earlier, I have uploaded the paper, but it is a powerpoint file.  It must have slipped my mind to convert it to pdf.  I also uploaded the invitation as presenter.  I am thankful to God that the bosses think it's a significant contribution to our Ministry of education.  I hope and pray and work for the success of education wherever I am.  In my college, I also present at intellectual discourse sessions, and my musical mnemonics are saved on CDs for the use of other teachers.

Presentation Motivation and achievement of Malaysian students in studying...

Data INVITATION AS PRESENTER/ jemputan sebagai penceramah

Why is it so easy to share on RG but not in our own University spaces?

Think following can be some possible reasons:

As RG is more open and free system!

RG requires only will, but at university requires to convince other persons and to fit to other objectives.

RG communication, as communication in specialised fora on the Internet, is more precise and to the point compared to talk with colleagues in the lunchroom at a university department, where there is a lot of communication channels and questions in parallel, and it is harder to know what is what, and easy to feel unsecure, etc.

It seems that the more restricted media channels we have, the more to the point we will be when expressing ourselves. When settling something over the phone on the other side of the world, we will be very precise on one thing only - but in communication with one's beloved partner in life at home, we presuppose a lot, communicate in many ways at once, there is a lot of context, relevant and irrelevant, etc and we sometimes misunderstand oneanother without knowing it at the time.

One teaching/learning parallel: communication in classrooms without any ICT is by teachers often viewed as direct and problemfree, while the same teacher feels very restricted when forced to use ICTs to communicate. But chances are, anyway, that she or she or he is more clear in the second case - ask the students!(research proposal) F2F communication is also mediated and problemfilled because of it "broadbandness" and "multichannel character" - sometimes much more so than ICT-.enabled communication. 

In my opinion, there is a bunch of reasons behind that, some of them are already mentioned by others colleagues. However, the weight of each reason changes from a person to another.

These reasons include:

-          Open-minded

-          Modesty

-          Kindness

-          Curiosity

-          Accepting criticism

-          More sure that someone will answer for how ask

-          Choose the question to answer

-          Multidisciplinary

-          Access in free time

-          Collaborating

-          Encouragement

So, in a virtual space like RG, there is more chance to have these reasons and others together helping information share more easily than any in other space like university or any other closed working space.

Dear Fadoua 

You have elaborated all the good reasons RG has emerged as a better platform for academic communication. 

Regards

Let us called it "Luke's Effect" !  There is not a Prophet who is received in his town.

Maria's dad was and is right.

I also think that social media offers extra freedom (to express as well as to 'read').

RG.. I have found a couple of people here at RG, a bit difficult to sustain a dialogue due to their 'special' dogmatism such as 'scientificism' (believe that science explains and justifies everything) and some other archaisms (skin color, certain obscure Eurocentric homophobia and general mental structure, religion as taboo, etc). Come on people, we are in the 21st century !

dear Jae, it´s nice telling us, that we are in 21 st century.

But isn´t  much more important telling this the people who don´t paticipate at  RG? :)

Peter

Peter, Thank you. My final sentence goes to only to few 'special cases' within RG because people outside the RG are unlikely to be reading these lines.

We did some research about 15 years ago (at Rolls-Royce plc)  looking at knowledge sharing, and what stimulates innovation and new ideas. There were some interesting findings.

85% of new ideas started with a conversation by one engineer to another that was nothing about the company.

A similar proportion were generated after an interruption in the daily routine.

The drinks making machine (where people congregated) was a key factor in stimulating conversations that lead to idea generation.

Open plan offices also stimulated knowledge sharing, although some found it distracting when they were deep in thought.

At Warwick University (in the UK) the manufacturing group used to distribute free tea and coffee with biscuits, always at specific times. This was a great way to get people to talk to each other including interdisciplinary chats.

So my answer to Debra's question is that perhaps the enclosed offices, and lack of an opportunity is the reason we do not share in our University spaces. Maybe some simple and low cost changes could make all the difference. I would be interested in the results of anyone trying an experiment in this area.

The advantage of RG is that people can come to it when they have spare time out of a busy schedule and its asynchronous nature (i.e. we do not all have to meet at the same time) means we can share more easily.

Best Regards

Paul

Debra - This is a great question and it appears from what I have read from my colleagues, that "personal distance" is a common theme.  I suppose it is the same "distance" that allows many people to interact within social media when they otherwise would be reluctant to interact in person. I suspect on other reason is control of time - I can post a questions and/or answer and then get back to work.  A personal conversation takes much more time - yes maybe more satisfying - but not  as diverse.  which leads me to another question (which I may post).  Are we simply too busy to have numerous face-to-face conversations or is that just me?  I do teach in an Online Master's program, so person my situation is skewed.

Such a nice Q Always want to ask

I think RG is available more which is easily & quickly accessible vs a university only operate during certain time zone and offers RG score to contributors vs no such motivation in a university.

Milad

• To answer
• To question
• To get feedback and
• To accept clarifications

voluntarily without any inhibitions and expectations makes RG a good forum. This connects researchers on a global-plateau. The opportunity to achieve together is far more than in a limited space constructs.

Dear Sir, All people should use scientific and logical discussion here for RG community.

Institutional spaces are restricted spaces.

dear Subhash,

thats very wise and true.

Peter

Your correct Sir.

less competition, more points

Following the prior opinions, the point may about the difference of the rule and how the people perceived it. Although both communities are in similar  scientific environment, but each community has their own rule.

Exactly

How to reproduce easiest way for immunotherapy asking pactical point of view?

Most of the Universities work in a closed and limited boundaries. RG on the otherhand has a open and unlimited space for its members !!

I believe that we know about our coleague researches, but sometimes we request a scientific text from them. Another problem is the reducionism system of research we have been practicezed in the Universities and Colleges. Generally, a researcher is alone in your sector of work. Meanwhile, our collegue in the front door is working with agrochemical, generally deadly to plants and animals (humans, too), and we do not want to work with this product in our experiment. My technical report about bees was shown to my collegue working the mechanization that have participate in another work about the Moringa plant; when I show the paper to him it show me the percentage of polen germination. Immediatelly we became partner in the Technical report and now I collected a lot of articles about bees and ideas that I discuss in my class room with the students. In fact, in some laboratories, the researcher are paying more attention on their own work. Researchers have to talk more each other about what they are doing, when there is no law impediment. In Brazil, we are building an University, thus we talk a lot to each other. We have to talk. Our next step is to invite teachers from other departments to talk to agronomists. If the idea set up we are thinking to invite people from other countries; but I do not know, yet. I hope my observation can help someone.

Walter.

Correct Sir

Interesting and relevant, Dear Debra. However, I am not absolutely sure of your question. I concur somehow with Subhash: University spaces are spaces a little more restricted, particularly between peers, but not in the universe of all staff and students.

Perhaps we may feel a little freer with virtual conversations or interlocutors that we never met before, as mentioned by Maria, given that the frog-scorpion syndrome is less evident or likely.

See “The Scorpion and the Frog” fable and comments by Giancarlo Livraghi, 2007, in the link bellow. Some excerpts:

“This is the story. A scorpion wants to cross a river, but it can’t swim. It asks a frog to help. The frog is worried, but the scorpion promises «I won’t sting you, because if I did I would drown». In mid river the scorpion stings the frog. The dying frog asks «why?» and the drowning scorpion answers «that’s my nature».”

(…)

“There are infinite ways in which someone can be placed in the role of the scorpion – or the frog. In this irritating tale there is a disturbing truth: it really happens that people behave in incomprehensible manners with no other reason than, nobody knows why, “that is their nature”.

There is no aesopian “moral” of this fable. Its strongest meaning is that it can’t be explained. It’s the essence of stupidity (harming others at one’s own disadvantage) taken to its extreme consequences. A disease that lies deep in human nature. There are many examples, practically every day. We can laugh when they are just funny. But some are dismally tragic.”

http://www.gandalf.it/stupid/scorpion.htm

Thanx for your collection Sir

Interesting 

At varsity, no-one was doing anything like the things I was doing. Yet someone in RG is doing something so close that we have to write a paper about it!

RG provides the platform to openly post and provides possibility to learn & cross-learn over various domains.While in an university setup, to obtain an access with other members is by itself a hurdle.

The age-old fact that "science is friendship" finds its best illustration here.

"science is friendship"  Sir has given correct answer so we all supporting group. 

Yes we are a group of mutual supporters.

Thanking you Sir, Wishing you all your good health and proprus life with family.

And all possible blessings to you and your's, Otto

Thanking you Sir. 

Respected Sir I am saluting him and thanking to you.

Liberty can not exist without discipline.

Thanking you madam